Solar Dynamic Observatory successfully imaged Venus’s atmosphere during yesterday’s transit
Solar Dynamic Observatory successfully imaged Venus’s atmosphere during yesterday’s transit. Cool images too.
Tag: science
Watch the Venus transit live
Watch the Venus transit live:
From space, from Solar Dynamics Observatory.
From Universe Today, on Youtube.
Watching the transit of Venus – from Saturn
Watching the transit of Venus – from Saturn.
Due to cost overruns, NASA has cancelled the GEM X-ray telescope.
Due to cost overruns, NASA has cancelled the GEM X-ray telescope.
Astronomers think they have discovered a distant supermassive black hole that is being ejected from its galaxy at a speed of several million miles per hour.
Astronomers think they have discovered a distant supermassive black hole that is being ejected from its galaxy at a speed of several million miles per hour.
Although the ejection of a supermassive black hole from a galaxy by recoil because more gravitational waves are being emitted in one direction than another is likely to be rare, it nevertheless could mean that there are many giant black holes roaming undetected out in the vast spaces between galaxies. “These black holes would be invisible to us,” said co-author Laura Blecha, also of CfA, “because they have consumed all of the gas surrounding them after being thrown out of their home galaxy.”
This conclusion however is not final. The data could also be explained by the spiraling in of two supermassive black holes.
The military has given NASA two Cold War era spy space telescopes with mirrors comparable to Hubble’s.
Big news: The military has given NASA two Cold War era spy space telescopes with mirrors comparable to Hubble’s.
They have 2.4-meter (7.9 feet) mirrors, just like the Hubble. They also have an additional feature that the civilian space telescopes lack: A maneuverable secondary mirror that makes it possible to obtain more focused images. These telescopes will have 100 times the field of view of the Hubble, according to David Spergel, a Princeton astrophysicist and co-chair of the National Academies advisory panel on astronomy and astrophysics.
Since astronomers have over the past dozen years been remarkably uninterested in launching a replacement for Hubble, they now find themselves in a situation where they might have no optical capabilities at all in space. Hubble is slowing dying from age, and NASA doesn’t have the money to build a new optical space telescope, especially since with any new space telescope proposal the astronomical community has had the annoying habit of demanding more sophistication than NASA can afford.
This announcement however might just save astronomy from becoming blind. Because these spy telescopes are already half built, it will be difficult to add too many bells and whistles. Hire a launch rocket, build the cameras and spectrographs based on the instruments already on Hubble, and get the things in orbit quickly.
Something caused the Earth to bombarded with cosmic rays in 775 AD but scientists have no idea what.
Something caused the Earth to bombarded with cosmic rays in 775 AD but scientists have no idea what.
A targeted SETI observation of Gliese 581, the nearest star with exoplanets in the habitable zone, has found no evidence of alien communications.
Radio silence: A targeted SETI observation of Gliese 581, the nearest star with exoplanets in the habitable zone, has found no evidence of alien communications.
This was a proof of concept experiment, and though they detected nothing, they also did not rule out the possibility of alien life, as their radio telescope wasn’t sensitive enough to do so. You can download the actual paper here.
Images from Messenger now appear to support past radio telescope observations that suggested there was water-ice in the permanently shadowed craters of Mercury.
Images from Messenger now appear to support past radio telescope observations that suggested there was water-ice in the permanently shadowed craters of Mercury.
Using the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have determined that the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies are on a collision course, and will meet head on in 4 billion years.
Using the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have determined that the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies are on a collision course, and will meet head on in 4 billion years.
You can download the science paper describing these results in detail here [pdf].
A U.S. senator has demanded the NIH explain how it could give a $2 million grant to a researcher previously punished for not reporting financial conflicts of interest who is also under investigation by the Department of Justice.
Corruption in Big Science: A U.S. senator is demanding the NIH explain how it could give a $2 million grant to a researcher previously punished for not reporting financial conflicts of interest who is also under investigation by the Department of Justice.
How scientists can author as many as 700 papers without even reading what they have written.
How scientists can author as many as 700 papers without even reading what they have written.
This is why we should all be skeptical about any peer-reviewed paper. There is a lot of fraud going on, sometimes for political reasons but mostly for reasons of status and financial reward. Science and the love of discovery often has nothing to do with it.